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Sports & Leisure

The nation's passion for sports is obvious every day—at NASCAR races, kiddie soccer matches, and countless other contests. From a handball used by Abraham Lincoln to Chris Evert's tennis racket to a baseball signed by Jackie Robinson, the roughly 6.000 objects in the Museum's sports collections bear witness to the vital place of sports in the nation's history. Paper sports objects in the collections, such as souvenir programs and baseball cards, number in the hundreds of thousands.

Leisure collections encompass a different range of objects, including camping vehicles and gear, video games, playing cards, sportswear, exercise equipment, and Currier and Ives prints of fishing, hunting, and horseracing. Some 4,000 toys dating from the colonial period to the present are a special strength of the collections.

This plastic yo-yo was made by the Duncan Toys Company in the 1950s. It has a pink body and clear rounded sides. It features an image of yo-yo champion Bob Rola on one half and multi-colored dots on the other. It reads “Duncan Yo-Yo for Coca-Cola World Champion,” and “Best Wishes, Bob Rola.”

This plastic yo-yo was made by the Duncan Toys Company in the 1950s. It is green with clear rounded sides. An insert under the sides has a graphic of a flying eagle and the text “Genuine Duncan Yo-Yo, Professional Para Campeonato, El Aguila.”

This plastic yo-yo was made by Playmaxx, Inc. in 1993. It has a black body with indented flat sides. There is a graphic of a red, white and blue shield on both halves. The yo-yo reads “The Nations Top Yo-Yo Players Meet in Chico California, The 1993 National Yo-Yo Championship.” The yo-yo commemorates the first modern national yo-yo championship in the United States.

This plastic yo-yo was briefly made by Duncan in the middle of the 1950s. Called the “Pony Boy,” it was intended for beginners. The yo-yo has green rounded sides, a red and orange rim, and a BB pellet inside that makes noise when spun.

This plastic yo-yo was made by Playmaxx Inc. in the 1990s. It was named the "ProYo" and has indented flat sides. It has a removable seal featuring a red and black graphic of Duncan Toys Company mascot "Mr. Yo-Yo" doing a “Texas Cowboy” trick. The "ProYo" line was started in 1976 by Donald Duncan, Jr., son of Duncan Toys founder Donald F. Duncan.

This plastic yo-yo was made by All Western Plastics in Nebraska during the 1950s. It has clear rounded sides and a yellow body, with a photo of movie cowboy Roy Rogers and his horse Trigger on one side. The other side features a printed advertisement for a "King and Queen" top spinner contest. The retail package reads: “It’s smooth and fast, it’s inside walls are slick as glass, no rough wood to catch the string, does all the tricks...its Roundup King.”

This plastic yo-yo was made by the Duncan Toys Company in the 1960s. It has a clear plastic frame embedded with multi-colored plastic shards. The yo-yo was made to promote the Walt Disney Company's "Wonderful World Of Color" television show, which began in 1954. One side features a golden hot -stamped globe and the words “Disney’s Wonderful World of Color.” The other side reads “Duncan Yo-Yo Return Top.”

This orange plastic “Duncan Butterfly” yo-yo was made Flambeau Products in the late 1990s. The Duncan Toys Company lost its trademark for the term “yo-yo” in 1965. The legal costs of the decision forced the company into bankruptcy. Flambeau, who had been making plastic yo-yos for Duncan since 1955, bought Duncan's name in 1968.

This plastic yo-yo was made by the Duncan Toys Company in the 1970s. It is made of translucent orange and green plastic and features an interior battery compartment. Battery power lit the yo-yo when it was spun.

This translucent plastic yo-yo was made by Yomega in the 1990s. Called the Phantom because of its translucent plastic, it features Yomega's trademarked "Brain," an internal clutch mechanism that helps beginners by automatically causing the yo-yo to return.